Golden Door Consulting. Doing My Thing.

From 1998-2007, I was self-employed.  It was the best time of my career.   I loved the freedom and flexibility it gave me.   When I wasn't traveling, I'd sit at my computer in my pajamas until the middle of the day, with my darling Yorkie, Danny, at my feet.   When I didn't feel like working, I didn't.   Most of the time I worked really hard, but it didn't always appear that way to others.  They'd see me coming out of the movie theater at 2p and think I wasn't up to much.   What they didn't know is that at 2a many nights/mornings, I was still plugging away at a report that I was determined to get just right for my client.  


I loved the challenge of constantly changing assignments.  Every project was a different topic so there was never an opportunity to be bored.  I traveled, met and worked with great people, and only worked on stuff I liked.   It was good.


Then the recession hit and I got nervous, closed shop, and took a "real" job.   And then another one.   I made more great friends, but I was never as happy as I was when I was working for myself.   So, last year when it seemed the economy was on the mend, I dipped my toe back in by doing a few projects with a couple of former clients…mostly to see if I still had it.  I did.   And I still loved it.   So after a fiasco at my last job, I knew I was done.   I'm not going to put myself in another situation where I'm subject to the fancies of others and I'm not part of the conversation.  Not if I can help it.


So,  Golden Door Consulting is back in business full-time, and I'm just delighted.  I'm doing consumer research, ideation workshops, and strategic planning for ad agencies and all kinds of companies that have products or services to sell...same as before.  I missed it a lot and I'm glad to be back.   I even bought a new pair of pajamas to commemmorate my re-opening.




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Three Spinsters in Idaho

I am spending a glorious, long Memorial Day weekend on a beautiful ranch in New Meadows, Idaho...which, on a map, looks like it's truly in the middle of nowhere.


After flying into Boise, it's a 3-hour drive through mountains, along lakes, white rapids, and winding roads.


Vita, my traveling companion and fellow Spinster, wondered if Lin --our host-- had lost his mind. WTF was he doing way out here? And then, we pulled onto the property ( he has 108 acres), we quickly answered our own question. It is magnificent!


Here's the view from the dining room window.


And the dogs.


And one of the horses.


We spent the weekend, eating, talking, drinking wine, lazing around, walking the ranch, feeding the horses, and watching elk at night. We drove into town, McCall, to visit a hat maker (Lin has dozens of cowboy hats)...


...and for dinner with friends at The Shore Lodge.


It even snowed one day! Yep. Snow in what is almost summer!


Lin has made quite a nice life for himself here. Vita, Lin, and I used to work together at an ad agency in NYC. Then Lin sold his fancy Upper East Side apartment and traded in his city life for that of a cowboy out west. Lin is a male Spinster. In other words, a Bachelor. (Notice that an unmarried man is a Bachelor if he's 25 or if he's 55). He's had an array of belles on his arm and even a fiance, but he never married. I think that could change soon, though. It seems that the folks out here are all determined to hook him up. A well-financed, straight, single, man-of-certain-age is like a prize out here. Everywhere, really. So the next time Vita and I venture out here ( and there will definitely be a next time), I wonder if the Three Spinsters in Idaho will be minus one. (Vita and I don't have people clamoring to hook us up. I'm just sayin'.) Lin is making oyster stew for us now, and preparing for a dinner party later this evening. What a fantastic trip this has been. Spinsterlicious, indeed!,

Location:New Meadows, Idaho

Josie: Spinsterlicious Reader of the Month!

From time to time, I get questions about the women who post comments on my blog.  "Who is she?"  "What's her story?"  I sometimes wonder about them, as well, so I thought it would be fun to find out. 


A few people have asked about Josie.  Josie and I have never met, but she's kind of a "friend in my head". Her take on a situation is often different from mine, so I look forward to her comments, and I also read her blog, Josie Speaks Up.

 Technically, she's not a spinster because she's been married, but she still shares much in common with many of us.  I asked her to share a few thoughts about herself...so in her own words: 

I enjoy Eleanore’s blog because she embraces the Spinsterlicious Life, and that’s what I’m trying to do.   I always was a late starter and despite wanting to get married, it didn’t happen until I had completely given up hope.  I met him on-line, and the sad thing is that he was the perfect man for me: sexy, attractive, thoughtful, intelligent, witty, considerate, patient, and a great dancer too.  I never wanted kids and he was OK with that.  So why was it sad?  He was then diagnosed with cancer, and I lost him four years later. So here I am single again, and surprisingly actually enjoying most aspects of single life.

I am dating because one day I think I’d like to be married again- although I’d hate to share my space again.  Maybe we could live next door to each other?  Dating, however, is leaving a lot to be desired. There’s a dearth of men in Melbourne (Australia). The ones I do get contact from on-line want to date someone 20 years younger than themselves, in which case I’m invariably not attracted to them.

In the meantime I try to figure where I fit in, and how I can be happy. Today’s society is filled with married couples and families - the ‘norm’ is celebrated and marketed everywhere.  I swing between sometimes feeling lonely and yet often loving being alone. So I work on appreciating what I have, appreciating my freedom, and appreciating the fact that I got to have any time at all with my husband.

Watching someone die makes you re-evaluate your priorities. So I decided I didn’t want to spend my life simply working, being stressed and putting all my energy into my job, and I decided to pursue my dreams.

What are my dreams? They are very modest. I want to be able to speak French, fluently. So I quit my job and returned to university. I am happy surviving on much less money that I had previously, and I study French. I am very bad at it.  Eventually, however, I will start doing some travel and live in France for six months to a year. I’m saving now. 

And of course, there’s blogging. I had forgotten how much I love to write, and mock myself. If you’ve finished reading all about me, you’d be forgiven for thinking I have little reason to laugh, but the opposite is true. I generally laugh long and hard. 

Quitting your job to follow a dream?  That's a pretty gutsy move...and that's why Josie is our Spinsterlicious Reader of the Month!  Thanks, J.  You have quite a story.   Good for you, much luck, and many thanks for supporting The Spinsterlicious Life!

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Singlism

Bella DePaulo is a Visiting Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara.  She's just published a new book,  Singlism: What It Is, Why It Matters, And How To Stop It …and I'm one of 28 contributing essayists!  (Yay!)


What Bella and I have in common is that we're both determined to chip away at the prevailing thinking that marriage is what grown-ups are supposed to do and that not doing so is, well, just wrong…and weird…and kinda pathetic.    Actually, Bella isn't just chipping away at it, she's using a sledgehammer.  Singlism is just one piece of a large body of Bella's work dedicated to combatting discrimination and silliness against the Unmarried.  She even coined the word Singlism.


And speaking of singlism (the act, not the book), I had dinner the other day with a dear friend, who got married just a couple of years ago.  She commented that she was surprised at how her social life has soared now that she's a married woman.  Paula has always had a pretty robust social life and now it's even robust-er.  She said she noticed that many women who she's known for years (while she was single) have now embraced her and began extending social invitations to her…when they never really had before.  Some invitations are for her and her husband, but many are for her.  Now that she's a married woman she has been welcomed into "The Club"!  This is funny to me…but also a bit silly, don't you think…unless, of course, you're one of the married women who isn't extending invitations to women who aren't married.  Geez.


Like sexism and racism, singlism isn't always intentional or conscious.  But like sexism and racism, it is very real.






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Don't Worry, Be Happy.

Don't worry. Be Happy.  Or something like that.  I read an article last Sunday in the  NYTimes about how a little bit of fretting is good for us.  Not a lot of fretting; a little bit.  The article is mostly about how dread is what spurs us on to take steps to get us out of an anticipated horrible situation.

The part that really caught my eye, though, was about how situations that we think are going to be horrible usually don't turn out to be nearly as bad as we thought they'd be.  I can think of 1000s of my own real-life examples where this was true, but the one that comes of my mind most is this:


When I was younger, I would keep a diary from time to time.  I was never good at it because I would get bored with it pretty quickly and usually end up tossing it aside after a few entries.  One day I came across a tossed-aside diary and started flipping through it.  It was about 2 years old.  As I was reading it, I came upon a page where I was in complete and utter despair.  I was heartbroken over some guy and the words that poured out were just so full of anguish.  My gosh, as I read it I felt so sorry for the girl I had been at that time.  I was clearly devastated and apparently couldn't imagine how life would ever be good again.  How would I get through this?

And here's the best part: even though only 2 years had passed, I couldn't figure out who it was that I was all broken up about. I couldn't remember who the guy was!!  At the time I was writing it, I didn't mention him by name probably because I assumed it would be obvious.  And just a short time later, he had ceased to exist.  Amazing.


Then I got excited.  Who was this MF who had gotten me all worked up?  I called a girlfriend.  "Who was I dating then that would have upset me like that?"  We wracked our brains going through the guys we could think of but none fit.  


Just like the article said, however miserable I thought I would become without this guy clearly hadn't happened.  I didn't even remember him.  I wish somebody had known to tell the "devastated me" that I wouldn't even remember this guy in a really short time. Of course I wouldn't have believed it…but now I always remind myself of that story.  And that's why people (who aren't terminally ill) shouldn't commit suicide.  Chances are you'll get over whatever it is that's making you nuts at that moment. Honest.


Do you have a story of how you got all bent out of shape over the possibility of something horrible happening…and then shortly after it happened you were fine?  I wanna hear about it. 






NOTE:  If you like "Spinsterlicious" and want to be notified of new posts, please subscribe in the box on the right -or- if you have a Google Account, you can click on "Follow Me" also on the right, near the bottom.   You'll receive an email each time there's an update to the blog.  Don't miss a Spinsterlicious update!

Other Women's Husbands

I can't ever remember wanting to be married.  The all-the-time-ness of it always seemed like too much.  I thought (and still think) that a husband would be a nice thing to have...but not every single day.  (Boyfriends are much better because they go home and, eventually, go away.)


If I could've figured out a sane way to have a (faithful) husband on a part-time basis, I possibly would have married at some point in my life.  Possibly.  But this week I realized that I have kind of figured out the part-time husband thing.  He's just not my husband.  More correctly, they're not my husband.  


You see, it occurred to me that I've come to rely on the husbands of my friends to do the things that my own husband would do if he existed.  (Well, no, not everything.  This is all very G-rated).  I'm fortunate to have a number of good girlfriends who are married to great guys.  Guys who willingly pitch in when I don't have a beau to do whatever it is that needs doing.  (I say "willingly"; I'm just hoping that's true).

This week I leaned particularly heavy on other women's husbands but, when I think about it, this is the kind of thing I've done for a long time.


Really, it's the best of both worlds.  They're funny and smart and useful...and then they go home...to their wives...before we start to get on each other's nerves.


A sampling of how other women's husbands have made my life better?

• Today, Susan's husband took a ride with me as I went to confront my wayward tenant about not paying the rent.  Having a man with me gave me more confidence, and I thought it would be handy to have him if a fight broke out.  (Kidding...but just a bit).

• Every day this week, Traci's husband helped me with my new computer that I don't know how to use.

• Last summer, Lorraine's husband really hooked me up.  He re-arranged and fixed so many things in my house that it almost looked like new when he was done.

• Once, I left an old car at this same house and didn't drive it for awhile.  Benilde's husband cleaned out the nest that some critters had made in the car engine.  (I would have just given the car away.  No way was I going near that).

The list goes on and on.  I'm very lucky to have friends who so freely share their husbands because Lord knows I wouldn't know what to do with one of my own.  Thanks, Girlies!!




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HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!! NO REALLY!!

What in the world is happening with Mother's Day!?  I was amazed, mystified, and somewhat amused all last week.  The run-up to Mother's Day was a major extravaganza...on steroids!  It seems to me that, this year more than any other, Mother's Day surpassed the over-the-topness of Christmas.

The television and newspapers ads were kind of what I'd expect.  Their job is to get you to spend as much as you can on a Mother in your life or, clearly, you're not a good person.  A card, a bouquet of flowers, or a loving visit are definitely not enough.  Advertising does this every year, though it seemed a little dialed up this year.  The gifts were more lavish, with at least one ad suggesting that Mom deserves a new car!

People on Facebook were encouraged to "show their love" for their Moms by posting a picture of her. I thought it was a cute gesture, but then it started to seem a little forced.  If you didn't do it, are you an unappreciative daughter? (This seemed targeted to women for some reason).    

Every one of the morning news shows and daytime talk shows, every single day last week, had a segment (or three) of all kinds of people proclaiming, repeatedly, their love, love, love for their mothers on national tv. The more excessive, the better.  Last week, every mother was perfect.  Nobody had a shaky relationship with their Mom, everyone was blessed with a paragon of virtue and goodness.  

What really tripped me up, though, was the number of people who wished me a Happy Mother's Day on Sunday.  I'm not a mother. I didn't mind it, but I did think it odd.  New Yorkers, who barely speak to each other on a normal day, were saluting total strangers with Happy Mother's Day.  Honestly, this happened to me 9-10 times.  I decided I must really look like a Mother until I heard from my sister and my friend Cece (neither of whom are Mothers) that the same thing had happened to them in Washington, DC where they live. 


Is it the assumption that every woman is a Mother...or would it just be too awful to overlook a Mother, so we just say it to everyone lest we not give someone her due?

When did Motherhood reach iconic status...in such public and exaggerated way?  Motherhood used to just be what women did.  Now it's larger than life.


I don't really know what this is about, but I can't help but wonder if it's not more than a coincidence that all this celebratory celebration is happening at the same time that a spate of articles and books are being published revealing that for many women Motherhood is harder, more stressful, and more depressing than they thought it'd be. A teeny tiny sampling:

• Time Magazine's Why Having Kids is Foolish
• New York Magazine's All Joy and No Fun: Why Parents Hate Parenting
• Naomi Wolf's Misconceptions About Motherhood
• The Book for Angry Moms

 At the same time that some brave women are admitting that this Motherhood thing ain't all it's cracked up to be, we're on the counter-attack to prove them wrong.  Why??  Isn't it ok for a woman not to be a Mother?  And isn't it okay for some women to admit they're not having a grand time with it?  What does it mean that we feel so compelled to concoct a myth rather than just live in truth?








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Another Magic Baby

A few months ago I wrote a post about  The Magic Baby.   A baby who was able to transform her sourpuss pre-baby mother into a paragon of sunshine and light.  It really was like magic.  This woman went from ill-mannered to amiable in the blink of a birth. I was amazed.  By your comments, some of you were not, so I suppose it does happen.

Fast forward to today.  One of my favorite couples is also having a magic baby.  She's not even born yet and she already is putting her magical powers to use.  Her parents, when they're not pregnant, are each  a great combination of seriously funny and really smart.  Mom-To-Be is a partner at a major consulting firm that is known for its eggheads. That's how smart she is.  Almost-Daddy is creative but not a (too)crazy creative, creative in a good way.  He makes films and has had his work shown at MOMA (The Museum of Modern Art).  Up until now they've been appropriately normal in most ways that matter.

We've been preparing for this baby for 8 months.  I say "we" because we live kind of in a college dorm-like situation in that we're in and out of each others' apartments just about every day, sometimes without even knocking. I have a framed picture of her in utero on my shelf.  Somehow, I just know they're going to figure out a way to finagle a bassinet into my bedroom when I'm not looking.

Anyway, Little Ellie, as I've been calling her after myself, is using her magical powers to transform her parents from normal-ish to major-league loopy.  J and J have been surprisingly calm and even-keeled for a first pregnancy...at least up until now.   Well, they're still calm and even-keeled but they sent me into a tizzy when I saw one of their baby registries.  It's at an impossibly cute chi-chi store in Tribeca, and is filled with the kinds of things that I want to make fun of.  Like a nightlight in the shape of a bear for $95.00.  And several other zoo animals, similarly priced.   And a birch clothes tree.  And a crib mobile also for $95.00 (Is that the only number the store owners know)?

I was in a tizzy because everything was so darned cute and so darned expensive and so darned unnecessary...at least to me, Mother-of-None.  And what's troubling me even more?  I've been giving serious consideration to actually buying Ellie the Bear Light.  Somebody stop me.

NOTE:  If you like "Spinsterlicious" and want to be notified of new posts, please subscribe in the box on the right -or- if you have a Google Account, you can click on "Follow Me" also on the right, near the bottom.   You'll receive an email each time there's an update to the blog.  Don't miss a Spinsterlicious update!

Life's Too Short...

Following is an exchange I had with a Spinsterlicious fan today.  I'm curious to know what y'all think:

Dear Spinsterlicious,

I have to visit my hometown this weekend and I’m only in town for a brief time.   I usually try to cram in catching up with as many of my family and friends as possible,  particularly since I do not go home very often.   I asked one of my best friends if he had time for me Friday evening.   I’m already somewhat annoyed that we can’t hook up until 9:15pm because he has caipoeira class that evening which, by the way, I think he should skip since I’m only in town twice a year, but on top of that, he wants to bring his girlfriend.   She probably won’t last until the end of the year and now I have to make small talk with this chick.  I really do not want to spend my precious little time with my friend trying to keep the conversation PG because his girl is there.  

Am I wrong for not wanting to hang out with her and seriously thinking about bumping him off the schedule for another friend?

Here's my response: 

I totally feel you.  I would like to say that you should just suck it up and get together with him and his girlfriend, especially since he's such a good friend.  However,  that's the grown-up me talking.  The real me says "blow them off"...but you can't tell him why.  Life's too short to be spending an evening with somebody you don't feel like being bothered with who is not going to be a significant person in your life.  Catch him next time.

Part of me wishes that I'd said something like "oh, you should be bigger than that.  Get together with them both and try to make a fun evening of it"...but I would have been insincere because it's probably not what I would have done.  What would you have done?

NOTE:  If you like "Spinsterlicious" and want to be notified of new posts, please subscribe in the box on the right -or- if you have a Google Account, you can click on "Follow Me" also on the right, near the bottom.   You'll receive an email each time there's an update to the blog.  Don't miss a Spinsterlicious update!